Wasserman Schultz offers rosy view of Democratic prospects in 2016

U.S. Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz of Weston, chairwoman of the Democratic National Committee, sought Tuesday to downplay widespread predictions of an approaching midterm election disaster for her party.

Offering an analysis that differs from some Democrats, lots of independent observers, and virtually all Republicans, Wasserman Schultz said that 2014 wouldn’t be such a bad year after all.

“We know that when Democrats vote, Democrats win,” she said more than once at a Washington, D.C., news conference carried on the C-SPAN3 cable channel.

She said her party has “an incredible data and technological advantage ”that will hep her party avoid November repeats of last week’s special election in Florida, in which Democrat Alex Sink – who was the early favorite in the race – narrowly lost to Republican David Jolly.

“We would have preferred the outcome to be different. Winning is better than losing any day of the week,” she said, downplaying the loss by noting the district had been Republican for 60 years. (Sink won the territory when she ran for governor in 2010 and Barack Obama won it in 2008 and 2010.)

She said the voters who went to the polls in the special election are “not reflective of what the general election electorate will look like” in November.

Wasserman Schultz sought to portray Republicans as out of touch with the desires of everyday Americans. “Our best weapon may be Republicans themselves,” she said. “Their policies are simply out of step with the majority of American voters.”

Her appearance followed an earlier event by Republican National Committee Chairman Reince Priebus, who predicted Republicans will sweep out many Democrats in November.

“I think we’re in for a tsunami-type election in 2014,” Priebus said at a Christian Science Monitor breakfast, as reported by Politico. ”My belief is, it’s going to be a very big win, especially at the U.S. Senate level, and we may add some seats in congressional races. But I need to and we need to at the RNC make sure that we can capture the positives and the benefits we’ve been able to provide in 2014 and build on that to have success in 2016, which is a very different type of election.”

No independent analysts predict Democratic gains in the Republican-controlled House, and both parties have been focusing intensely on the Senate, where Democrats have a 55-45 majority. The independent Rothenberg Political Report’s latest estimate is that Republicans are “likely” to gain between four and eight seats.

Wasserman Schultz said that wouldn’t happen, telling reporters that she was “confident that we are going to hold the Senate.”